Are You A Charlotte?Is That You In Painting Number Three?... (S1E5 "The Power of Female Sex")
Hats off to you.... Kirstin delivers a fashion revelation that has us scratching our heads. As we begin to analyze Carrie's money woes, one can consider if Carrie Bradshaw should be better with her finances or if it makes perfect cents? Kristin admits to one of her worst fears, which is realized within this episode.
And, she explains why Charlotte's bold behavior with Neville is not surprising at all.
Hi, I'm Kristin Davis, and I want to know are you a Charlotte? Hello, everybody, welcome, Welcome back to Are You a Charlotte Today when we are.
Going to recap episode of one oh five. It is called.
Oh my Gosh, The Power of Female Sex. Don Don Don do, and it is just me. I'm recapping just me and myself today. So for the fan who wrote in on the Instagram page saying, you know, can you explain the guests at the top of the show, the guest is.
Myself, So I hope that's okay with you guys.
All Right, this episode is so fascinating and when I rewatched it, I was wow shocked. Didn't remember lots and lots of it. Did remember some of it. But also, like when I think about the first season, part of the reason that I feel like in my mind I had felt like, no, no, no, the first season is like a mess is because we really are kind of all over the place, like different things happen, one of which we'll get to in a second that are kind of unexpected and odd, and I feel like we were trying things out. And then also when I look back now, I'm just so impressed by so many things about it, and in this particular episode, there's a lot of really fascinating conversation about power and sex and men and women and the power of female sexuality that I'm just so kind of amazed by and just happy that I got to be a part of it in a lot of ways. And the other thing I think of it, I'm just going to say this at the top too, because you know, I have my drive to the podcast studio, and I always think about things on my drive in the morning before we do the podcast, and today I was thinking about the fact that I'm so grateful that I got to do the show for all of the gazillion hundred many years that I've been doing it, and that I got to grow up on it, because when I look back at myself, I seem like I am just so incredibly young and unformed, and I'm just so grateful that someone hired me and let me stay while I turned into a grown up, because that's kind of.
How I feel.
I feel like I grew up on this show, even though technically it's not really true. But like when I look at myself, especially in episodes like this, I'm like, I'm like a little child. I'm like a little innocent child making a lot of faces.
But anyway, that's my commentary on myself. But we'll get into more detail, all right.
This episode is extremely fascinating. It is directed by Susan Settleman, who also directed the pilot, and written by Jeni Cohan. Do you remember back when I said I didn't know any of the writers from the first season.
Not true. Ginger Cohan is amazing.
She created Orange is the New Black, you guys, can you believe? Also weeds, and she wrote an episode in our very first season called the Power of Female Sex. She was already onto her themes, and those themes are very much in play in our episode, for better or for worse, but they are in play in a very interesting way. We also have a different DP, so in case I don't know how much you guys are interested in the technical stuff, but to me it's interesting. So our very first pilot, we had Stuart dreiberg amazing DP. It's very dark. Then we have Maurice Alberti French, very very very cool shots.
Those were the first two episodes.
Now we have Michael Barrow, who we had for a while and I had forgot about him, but I remembered him when I watched this, partly because the show is very dark first season, like physically dark, you know, not dark thematically, but physically dark, Like we're out at night a lot.
It's very dark.
Also in the technical realm, we used to film on something called Super sixteen, which is kind of hysterical if you know anything about film and whatnot that now in the age of you know, digital high deaf, it's like so shocking that we filmed an entire TV show on Super sixteen. But what was great about it was that it gave like this kind of gritty softness. So like when we're out at night and we're on the street, the car lights kind of flare in a certain way, like it has a very kind of to me old fashioned feeling that I really love, and I thought that that was very much in evidence in this episode, as well as some just generally dark clubs and or restaurants that may or may not be real or sets.
I'm really not sure I need to find out.
Okay, So the interesting thing about this there's so many interesting things, but it begins with Samantha and Carrie waiting forty five minutes for a table. It's something that we're calling Ballzac, but it's really standing in for Balfazar, which opened that year. Still a fantastic restaurant in New York that we go to frequently and we love, but at the time it was a very very hard reservation to get.
And New York is really still like this.
Like we were in New York film and just like that when all the COVID things were letting go, you know, lifting and you could go out.
To eat again.
And I was trying to get my kids and I were just like, oh, hey, let's go to this restaurant.
They would not let me in. And not only that, they were so mean. Okay, they were so mean, and I was like, why why so mean? Like we're just just back out in the world, like and I remember, oh, we're in New York. This out is it's never gonna change.
So anyway, there's so many things I love about this whole Balthazar slash Ballzac.
You know, fill in one is the hostess. So I don't know.
If you guys follow the hat saga on Sex and the City and the movies and then just like that, but Sir Jessica and our costume designers love hats. Michael Patrick King cannot stand hats, so whenever we wear a hat, we have to ask permission. And I personally have had a few hats where I'm wearing like a one's coming up in a couple episodes from now. I've got a big, you know, wide brimmed hat on, but they can't see your face and they can't light your face, so then it's a whole drama.
And then the dp's like, oh, you've got to push it back, and.
Then you're wearing a hat and this very weird angle, and I'm sure everyone who's watching it is like, why is she wearing her.
Hat like that? That's not how you wear that hat.
Well, we're wearing it because you can't see our face under it, right. So to me, this hostess, this beautiful woman who plays the hostess who has to be kind of aloof and mean for most of the episode to both Carrie and Samantha, she has assorted various small hatch perched on her head, which really makes me laugh. And she pulled it off beautifully. And I cannot wait to talk to Molly Rogers, our costume designer, who was from the beginning with us, from the beginning. I believe she's listed as costume supervisor in the first season, so I can't wait to talk to her about the hostess and the hats. But they're they're they're waiting for this hostess to let them in. She will not let them in, Samantha says. This is when we start with the power the power topic. Samantha points out that if the hostess was a man, they would be sending over free drinks and obviously already be at their table, which is interesting, right, And I think to myself, like, hmm, this is interesting and I have to mould this over. This is one of those ones where I really think, like is this still all the same or is it not? And I'm not sure and I'm dying to hear what you guys think. I think a lot of it is still at play, but I also think that sometimes it's more like out in the open, you know, it's not so underneath everything. I feel like people are more open about it, so.
They leave.
They carry's really hungry, and Carrie's really like just rolling her eyes a lot, as Samantha like, I'm so hungry, You've got to get out of here.
She wants to go to a high restaurant. Samantha is like no.
So then Carrie decides that the way to cheer herself up is to go to Dulce Incoba and try to buy some beautiful, fluffy shoes.
Well, guess what.
They decline her credit card, and not only that, they chop it in half, which is super mortifying. Now, one of my producers for the part said to me, like, can you believe Carrie's not good with money? I'm like, yes, I can believe Carrie's not good with money. This is a through line and it's going to be true forever, Okay. And the reason that Carrie's not good with money, in my mind is that Carrie is a creative. And this is a fundamental thing about Carrie that I think people forget where they're like, why.
Would she wear that? Well, she's wearing that because she's a creative being. She's a writer.
Her whole existence is a creative endeavor. She's researching things, she's thinking about things, she's wondering about things. As you guys know, she's investigating things. She's creative, right, That's what she is. She's not Sir Jessica Parker, who's creative but also very practical.
She's Carrie. Carrie's not practical. No, no, no, no.
She loves shoes. You know, as you guys know who's seen the show. This will come to be a big point later on when Carrie cannot buy her apartment because she has spent all of her income on shoes, and she comes to Charlotte and asks for her engagement, which I know is a very hotly contested episode, and we will get there, and I have a lot to say, but in the meantime, here we are seeing the very first signs of it. In episode one, she tries to buy these shoes, they cut her credit.
Card really meanly, unhappy.
I don't even know if they do this anymore, but I do remember being afraid that it would happen to me in life, right, and I don't think it ever did, but I remember being afraid. At which point she runs into this fantastic character named Amalita. Now many people have asked me about Amalita ever since this episode aired many hundred years ago, and I'm always like, I'm Aalita, I'm Alita. I only vaguely remember watching this. I was so impressed by Carol Davis no relation to me, that I know of though we could be sisters, but I don't think we are. But she's incredible, so incredible, and she plays this very worldly, fantastic woman who's beautifully dressed and has all these boyfriends in different countries and knows everywhere to go and all the different countries. And when I watched it, I thought, you know, this is almost like an influencer back before we had influencers. Like she's one of those people where they know everything and they're just fabulous, Like everything they do is fabulous. Right, So Amalita says, I'm going to buy your shoes for you, because you are like a sister to me, and Carrie is like I never see her and I've only met her a few times.
This is in voiceover.
Of course, it's all very interesting, but Amalita to me seems like she's got really good vibes, you know, And she's just like, I will buy this for you. And here's my boyfriend, my rich boyfriend, and he has a tiny, tiny you know what, but he knows how to use it, at which point I'm just like, oh my god, we're so funny. Our show is so funny, and I forget all these things you know, back in the olden.
Days, we used to say all this stuff.
So she buys her these shoes. Carrie also tells the camera that al Alita.
Is euro trash. I don't know if we say this anymore.
You guys.
I don't know if it's okay to say this. I feel like maybe it's not.
But Carrie says it without without judgment. This is another moment where I really think, through this whole episode, Carrie is remarkably judgment free up until like the end of this episode, and then you see a little bit of her going like, no, thank goodness, but anyway, we'll get to that. So then Carrie Carrie lets her buy her shoes. Now, look, I think the reason that Carrie lets her buy the shoes is because she's avoiding, like, you know, complete and total embarrassment of having her credit card caught up. And she really is fully addicted to shoes, as she later tells someone, And so for her in a bad spot, this is, you know, like a little hit of dopamine, right, Like, she's getting some shoes, she's getting some new shoes. She's happy, so of course she's gonna let her buy the shoes for her. Yes, do I think that's a little weird. Sure would I let someone that I barely know buy me shoes? Probably no, Probably no, no, probably no. But you know, this is Carrie, and she's easy going, especially back back in you know, nineteen ninety eight, we're.
Way easy going. Okay, So then, oh this is so good.
Then we go we go home with Carrie and she has a stack of bills and she throws them in her trash, which, again another one of our producers was like, can you believe she did that? I'm like, yes, I can. She writes a column for a New York City newspaper, right, she's trying.
To go out by fantastic shoes and clothes. She say, some money for her bills. This is how we meet Carrie.
You know, she's evolved a lot, but this is who she was in the beginning.
For sure.
So I was not surprised at all. And we do see that her address on the envelope is two forty three E seventy third Street, which I do believe is accurate in terms of the book that Candice wrote and where the coffee shop was that we used to see. But we're no longer seeing the coffee shop we're slowly moving into you know, we haven't had the stoop yet. We're getting the different elements of carness together. This particular episode, we see her in her closet, which is really fun for me at least, it was really fun to see her in her closet and her bathrooms in the back, and we had so many scenes in those areas. It was a good time to see it. Okay, so we're in her apartment. She's throwing out her bills very durable. She says, you know, the voiceovers back and looking at the cameras back, which is interesting because I thought that we already lost it, but no, it's back. So again, this is something that I remember from the beginning. It seemed week to week that we didn't really know who we were as a show, you know. So sometimes when you're watching these episodes, things flip back and forth and you're like, oh, right, we didn't know, like was it gone? Was it talking to camera gone? No, No, it's not gone, it's back. So whatever was going on with that, it's interesting. So she says in her voiceover that she envies Almalita, and then she says to the camera, where is the line between a professional girlfriend and professional So this is interesting to me because I feel like in twenty twenty five, I feel like the idea of people who engage in work for sex, sex sex workers, it's just a lot more freedom to talk about, freedom to like take them seriously, not to judge them. You know, we have this movie at Nora, Who's up for an Oscar may win an Oscar very openly about a young woman of trying to live in New York engaging in stripping and sex work. We've got Pink Pony Club by Chapel Roone very openly about you know, having fun up on the stage at our high heels. I mean, I feel like we've come a long way. But the interesting thing that I think here back in our show in nineteen ninety eight is that Carrie's talking about it.
She's not really judging it. She's just discussing, like, is there.
A line between professional girlfriend and professional is there not?
You know, where do I fall on that line? Where do I want to fall?
I love that, and I think we're gonna have so many interesting conversations. For some reason, we played poker at Carrie's which.
How this happened?
I'm like, what do we know how to play poker. Did anyone at that table know how to play poker? Because I definitely didn't. Many people have tried to teach me since then. It's never stuck. But you know, clearly we're trying to play poker for some reason. I don't know whose idea this was. It's super interesting. So we're there, we start discussing the power of female sex. Women can use their sexuality to get ahead wherever possible, but men shouldn't be allowed to take advantage of it.
This is kind of one of the ideas that's.
In there, just super interesting, right, at which point Charlotte says, hmm, well, what if someone just says you're charming? She kind of like floats this idea out there gently as she does, and it turned out that there's an artist. Because you know, Charlotte's whole beginning storyline is in my mind, largely about her love of art and that she works in the gallery. And you know, in the pilot she goes to see the Ross Spleckner. That's why she goes to the guy's apartment that she then leaves. You know, like there's the art art art art, right, So in this particular setting, this artist named Neville Morgan, who's definitely, definitely a fictional character, has come into her gallery and kind of gently flirted with her and invited her to come to his studio out in rural Connecticut, which you will see soon.
And basically Miranda.
Says to her, if he asks you to hold his paintbrush, you know, let's sue him because that's the only way to use power as a woman. Something like that, which is so Miranda, right. So Miranda, and obviously Samantha has a lot of other things to say, which is also interesting, and she's gonna say more soon too. I literally could take just clips of Miranda and Samantha discussing female sexuality and power and play them and discuss only them for an entire podcast, I think, because it's super interesting. But at this point, Skipper shows up. Skipper, this episode made me laugh out loud so hard.
He is so funny and such a short amount of time.
I mean, also in the pilot, I last laughed out loud because he you know, when he comes to the bar and then she pushes it up against the bar, It's just like a really funny dynamic to me. So Skipper comes to pick her up, he's an hour early. It's like so embarrassing for him, I think. But and Miranda is just I literally could not roll her eyes more. There's a lot of eye rolling in this episode, which I also really really enjoyed. So she goes off with Skipper for a date with a lot of eye rolls. Carrie tries to go to bed and I think she has an eyemask on, which is also adorable and very har and we see many of it as they come and Amlita calls and wants her to get back down there to Ballzac, which is funny. So she goes and she's reading, which is great. She's reading a Martin Amos book. It's called Night Train. I'm sure that Sir Jessica has something to do with the book. Sir Jessica, I'm sure you know it is a huge, huge reader. Martin Ame is super, super smart, fascinating writer. I don't know exactly what it is. Apparently it's a detective type of a murder mystery, which seems odd, but you know, I think she probably reads a lot of different things. So we go back down this hostess wearing a different hat. She says, you're not on the list, but Malita is there with a twelve thousand dollars bracelet that she's showing off, and she brings Carrie in, at which point she meets Jille, who's an architect from Paris.
I had such.
Petrovski type ideas while this was going on. It's like an early, early early version. They have like kind of a you know, European kind of a whirlwindy thing with a handsome, you know, guy from another country I don't know.
Reminded me of that.
So Carrie feels interested, though she says, you know, I see some red flags, divorced French and uncomfortably handsome. I just want to say, none of those would be red flags for me. I mean, that's it's funny to me that Carrie would flag those but not flag you know a lot of other things with a lot of other people.
But okay, okay, let's go with it. Okay. Then there's a bunch of questions on my thing here by I'm going and ignore them.
I'm gonna keep talking, all right. This is where something super fascinating happens. So Carrie is walking down Fifth Avenue with Yell and it's beautiful. It's you can tell that the weather is starting to turn nice. We always went to film in like February roughly, and our show would come on roughly in June. So for those first like February March, it could be bitter bitter cold, but it didn't matter. We had to still wear little dresses. So you can see everyone's kind of got like light coats in this episode, whereas in the pilot or in the first episode we've come back, we've got like wool coats, like hardcore coats. Now we've got little light coats. And the trees are in bloom. So for me, I'm like, oh, thank goodness, the trees are in bloom. It's gonna be warm soon. It's gonna beautiful. So they're walking down the street and they have a very sweet conversation where she kind of confesses to him that she has like an addiction and he looks like oh, and she goes, you know, to beautiful shoes. It's very sweet and charming, and he's very sweet and charming to her, and then she basically says something to the effects the effect that she is floating, and.
She actually floats, which is so weird.
And I don't remember this, and I don't know how they did it, Like, I don't know if she was up high and the camera like comes down under her, because I don't think they put her on wires on Fifth Avenue because I feel like I would remember that, right. But it's like a little bit of magical realism in our show there. I'm not sure why, you know, I'm not sure what the thinking was.
I have no memory of it. But I think it's kind of sweet.
I mean kind of maybe a little cheesy, but also kind of sweet because Carrie, it is so easily transported into being like levitating basically, which is adorable by this handsome frenchman. So also, oh, we're gonna come soon to me going to Connecticut. I'll wait to tell you, but there's a connection between the lovely actor who plays Jill and the lovely actor who plays my artist guy. But I'll get there in a second. So now we're at Carries and she makes a date with the frenchman. The next day she's there, she's getting ready for this date. Skipper comes over because he wants to talk about Miranda. Now, one thing that really caught my attention is that he does not get buzzed in. Now, the reason I bring this up is because there's an episode of And Just Like That where someone comes over to Carrie's apartment also doesn't get buzzed in, and the internet went crazy. People the internet was like, how could they get in there without being buzzed in? People were texting me how could that character get in there without.
Being buzzed in?
I was like, wow, you guys need to lax. Okay, my gosh. Now, in reality, yes, most buildings in New York have either a doorman or a buzzer or some kind of system, right, So it's true. You can't just really walk up stairwells to people's apartment, hopefully at least. But Skipper somehow does. So he rings her little doorbell. She goes to the door, she answers it. She's only partly dressed for her date. She's like, come on in, I'm getting dressed. Skipper very politely comes in, sits on the bed, doesn't look at her. She's getting dressed in her closet, which is right behind her bedroom, as you guys probably know. But it is kind of adorable, and you think to yourself, gosh, do Skipper and Carrie know each other this well?
That she would just go ahead getting dressed.
And I also think it's kind of this is like the bohemian Carrie.
This is like Carrie.
You know, we're all much younger, right, so it's like her bohemian self, Like, yeah, Skipper, sit there and I'll just get dressed. Like she walks through the room in her skirt and her bra. We don't really see this later, do you know what I'm saying?
But it's interesting. It's almost like we're in college. Like I watched this episode and I'm like, it's kind of like.
Maybe we just got out of college last year, like we're new to the city.
I don't know. I just get those vibes when I watch it. But anyway, Skipper's there.
And he says to Gary that you know, he's just obsessed with Miranda.
It's so adorable. I mean, it really is so cute. He thinks he's addicted to her. She's all he can think about.
He only gets to have sex with her in the afternoon, and he doesn't shower after. This made me laugh so hard because Sarah Jessica is so brilliant. She's touching him when he says this, at which point she looks down. There's a few beats, she slowly lets go of his hand and the next thing you see she's washing her hands, which is so funny, like it's just very subtly done with her really incredible comic timing.
So it's pretty funny.
And the funny thing that Carrie says is she says, I really think that you should spend the night with her and not have sex.
It's really important.
And I'm like, wow, who is this woman interest relationship advice in terms of the fact that Miranda is not going to be going for this, so I feel like, you know, maybe that's not great advice to give to Skipper because it's not going to go well.
It's not going to go well at all. But nonetheless she gives the advice.
So then Carrie goes out on this incredible afternoon montage with Jill. They go to literally all of my favorite places in Central Park. At one point, she's sitting on the Alice in Wonderland sculpture near the boat pond.
You know, she's on the promenade in the park.
I mean, it's like glorious and the park is looking so beautiful. She's wearing a slightly insane outfit that I think involves possibly like a feather boa or a feather trim jacket. It's very trippy, but in general, stylistically, I feel like we're really starting to see Kerry in this episode. She has some fantastic dresses. Also, Amalita is dressed beautifully, like Samantha is dressed beautifully.
I can see that pat.
Field is working her way in there, you know, which is great to see.
Okay, So they go.
On this whole montage type date and she makes out with him, and then she says something like I have a rule that I don't sleep with.
A man that I haven't known more than a day.
But then she goes ahead, which is kind of funny, which I'm like, I didn't know you had any rules, but you know, it's all very interesting. So she sleeps with the lovely frenchman and then she wakes up in the very very posh hotel and he tells her how beautiful she looks while she's sleeping, but that he can't stay because he has a plane to catch, and then he says, I'll call you, and later on she realizes that she doesn't have his number and he doesn't have her number, which is also really interesting, like how did they find each other the next day?
I don't know.
It's very different obviously in nineteen ninety eight than it is now. So he leaves and he says, stay, stay, have room service, and she says okay, and then she realizes that he's left her a note.
She goes, oh, but he left me a note, so she opens the envelope.
There is, in fact a piece of paper, but there's also one thousand dollars.
I don't remember this at all, you guys.
It is wow, fascinating to think about and really really interesting and also really pretty mortifying. Like I think I would definitely die a million deaths if that ever happened to me.
But I also feel like he was so sweet.
To her, and she told him about her money problems, right, I think she told him like I have an addiction to shoes, you know. I don't think she told him that her bills were sitting on her table and that she threw them away, but you know, she shares, and he says something like, oh, doesn't writing pay.
Well She's like, no, no, it does, which is like funny.
Also, but you know, it's all very interesting, So maybe he's just leaving her some money to buy some shoes, like, I didn't necessarily think that he meant it, like, yes, I thought you were a prostitute. I do not think that he thought that she was a prostitute. Okay, that seems weird to me. I don't know, I don't know.
Maybe it was just that that actor did a really good job.
So what I was going to tell you about that actor? His name is Ed Frye. He was on a soap opera in New York called Another World, as was Charles Keating, who plays my artist, and you guys, so was I on that soap opera. I had a recurring part on that soap opera right after college.
And the reason I remember is that, first of all, I used to love to watch it.
I don't know if you guys know what soap operas are, because I don't think they're really a thing anymore. But there used to be soap operas in New York and soap operas in LA and it was a great job if you could get it, because you got to go.
To work like every day or whatever.
You know, it was like, you know, sixty minutes a day of show, right, so like Monday, She's gonna say Thursday, Friday, every day had an hour of that show on. And when you were little, those of us who were my age, you know, your moms might watch these things, right, so like if you got to stay home from school, you could maybe watch the soap operas with your mom. It was really dramatic, and I remember being super fond of them and thinking like, yes, I could be on a soap oper but that would be great. That was something that I thought would be fantastic right when I got out of college and I went on there and I did really really enjoy it.
Wait are you finding it, Easton?
Is it on there?
What was my name?
My name was Paige, you guys, thank you? My producer Easton looked at up. My name was Paige. Don't ask me what I did. I have no idea. I just remember being there and then it was very exciting. And isn't it strange and funny that two actors from that show. Charles Keating was on that show a long time, like he was a mainstay of Another World and he was a lovely, lovely actor. So anyway, funny and strange to me to realize this when I'm looking back on it, I don't think I realized it. Then Okay, they're in the hotel room. Carrie calls Miranda and Samantha to come over. They come over, and they ordered just a whole bunch of food because they're going to spend the Frenchman's money. And they have a very fascinating conversation that I really would play for you guys if I could right now, but I don't have it. They discuss money, money is power, sex is power. Money for sex is simply an exchange for power. I believe, Samantha says that, I think, and then Miranda is like, no, you know, don't give away your power. You know, you want to have your own power. And they kind of overlap each other, which is also kind of unheard of in our show and something that we didn't get to do much of as the years went on. But I really love the whole conversation, and I think that it's very interesting back then, and I think it's very interesting now and now. Like I don't know if you guys feel this way, but sometimes when I'm talking to people, like, for instance, well I shouldn't mention anyone, but for instance, sometimes I talk to people about dating and dating in New York La wherever, and people talk about that younger women are into status, that they're like they might be dating the older guy for status and money or power. I think something to that effect, and I believe Blakely and I talked about this last week because people had a lot to say on the Instagram about, you know, whether men who have status and power care at all about what women think.
Someone thinks they don't, And I.
Was like, Lol, that's what I said, because you know, I think everyone wants to be loved. This is what I think. But obviously I play Charlotte, right, so of course I would think that. But to my mind, everyone wants to be loved, like truly deeply loved. Maybe it's more important to some people and less important to others, but even men with status and money want to be loved. I'm just sure they do. I mean, do they probably do what they want anyway?
Yes, they probably do.
But I do think that people, in general, men and women want to be loved, right. But I also think sometimes that women have been socialized to think that they need to achieve a certain status, and that that status might be based on what man they were dating, or what that man has.
Or drives or what his job is.
And to me, I think that's kind of sad, only because when that man changes his mind, what is that woman going to be left with? And I always feel like, do not depend on a man for your financial well being. That's my personal advice in general. I know I'm getting into terrible, terrible territory.
At this point, but whatever.
But I love these conversations because I do think it's still very, very very interesting to talk about men and women and money and sex and power and the exchange of that. And I love the kind of liveliness with which it is discussed in the episode. Then, oh Lord, oh Lord, we cut to Charlotte, and Charlotte is out in the woods in Connecticut. She's gone to see this artist who she thinks that she's going to get to represent. Now we don't exactly say this, but when it says something like Charlotte's coop, I think it says that's because she's it's like a big get to get to be summoned by this artist out to his studio in the rural wilds of Connecticut.
So she goes in and he gives.
This incredible little monologue about the source of all life and pleasure and beauty that is really like wow, and I really enjoyed, and I feel like we should like print it out and put it somewhere. But he gives this very beautiful speech while the lights are still kind of off in his kind of barn slash studio, and Charlotte's just standing there like wide eyed, like wow, you know what's he going to show me? And then he he when he goes on for a while about the you know, the power and the source of all life, it turns out that these are very much Georgia O'Keeffe inspired paintings that could be flowers, but they're not. There's something that he uses a C word for that I'm not going to use, okay because I draw a line as did Charlotte, but that word just starts getting thrown around right and left, just right and left, and Charlotte's just like oh God.
And then his wife.
Comes in and she also uses the sea word, which is also very very prescient of things to come in the show. I don't know if you guys remember, like we have kind of older couples who teach sex courses and things coming. I mean like, oh, I had many flashes in my mind when I was watching this episode of these very interesting, you know, kind of bohemianish, artsy types of older couples who have a lot to say and teach us people about sexuality and free use of the sea word. I'm sure you guys know what I mean, but I'm definitely not going to say it. I just don't think I can. I just don't think I can. It does remind me also of pat Field, though, because the highest compliment for pat Field is to say that something is sea unt. Why that was like, hi, praise, okay, but when she would kind of like shouted at you in her deep voice, it always seemed a little scary, but she really meant that as a compliment, like that was a big, big, big compliment if you could get that compliment from Pattfield. So basically, this artist asked Charlotte if she will pose for him, and uh, she doesn't exactly say yes, but it kind of seems like she might say yes because the wife is there helping, which I think gives Charlotte some sense of safety. Though literally I cannot imagine that she does this. I mean I think she does this based on the show, but like, I don't know how that went down.
I don't understand it at all, and it also made me.
Think of you know, coming up soon, I think, is when Charlotte decides to look at her own private parts.
Do you guys remember this?
And I fall off the bed, which is one of the many times I've fallen.
Off a bed in this show. It's always really fun to do. I did it not too long ago. It's an enjoyable thing to do. But that's coming. I don't know what season is coming.
So I guess this is like a journey for Charlotte of discovery, I guess, And for whatever reason, maybe it's because it's art, Okay, She's like, okay for the art.
I can do this for the art. And then later you're going to.
See the gallery showing at her gallery, which is a big deal for her, right, So she is thinking about her own career advancement, like I think that is her goal, Like, I'm going to make a name for myself in the art world, and this is one way.
To do it. And it's secret that I posed.
Right, So all the friends come and they're all trying to guess which painting is to her, and I do vaguely remember being vaguely embarrassed and just trying to roll with it, Like just like the taxicab, you know, last episode. I'm not going to say either, you know, I'm just like, Okay, they're writing for me. I've just gotta you know, seem like I'm game. I've just got to make it work somehow. I'm sure that I was using all of my actors substitutions in my mind, right, Like what kind of thing would I do for my job, something like doing a crazy storyline on a show that I really want to be on, right, Like, I'm probably using the very thing that's happening in life for my substitution for Charlotte storyline. It's very similar because I'm just like, I need storyline. I'm going to go with this slightly insane thing that they're writing for me because I'm just really really happy that they're writing something for me.
Okay, cut back to the show.
We're back at Pretend Balthazar, Samantha and Carrie show up again and the host is there with a different hat. You guys, it's amazing. They think they're going to get in because Carrie has already been there. But no, no, no, it is not easy Amalita is there. She invites Carrie to come to the Venice Film Festival with a whole new group of handsome men who are this time from Italy. But one of them puts his arm around Carrie and then kind of the arm slips down in a way.
Carrie does not like this.
So I was really pleased to see this, like Carrie kind of you know, getting her sense of self there and realizing, no, you know, she's going to have her morals. Her voiceover says like, you know, I realize, like there's a line between what I'm willing to do and what I'm not willing to do. So then she goes to the bathroom. She politely excuses herself. She goes to the bathroom.
The hostess is there and she looks all vulnerable and she.
Needs a tampon, and it's so cute because Carrie's like, yes, I have one. And then after that they always get into the restaurant, so it's good. It's like women on each other's side. You know, it all works out. Then at the very end, we are at the art gallery. The friends are there. Unfortunately Stanford's not there. I was really hoping this was the art gallery scene where Stamford was there, but I think that's coming later.
But the girls are there.
Everyone's trying to guess which one of these paintings might be Charlotte.
And I tell Carrie in her ear.
Which one is me, and she tells I think Samantha. And I'm just like, oh my god, this is so mortifying. But you know, I'm standing there and I'm looking, I'm looking, I'm looking pleased, and I'm giggly whatever. And I think a lot of it was like just being game, you know, like you're in this show. This show doesn't know what it is. We're figuring it out together. And I feel like everyone, most definitely Sarah Jessica, because she's talking to that camera again.
You know, she's floating up in the air.
She's like, we're doing so much stuff, you know, it's very interesting to me. Now. One of my favorite things, just from a personal personal note, is that in that art gallery, Sarah is wearing this kind of kimono robe that has like payettes on it. This is a robe that still exists in Carrie's closet and just like that, and I feel like I just saw it like a couple of weeks ago, so For me, it was adorable because I thought it was only a robe that she wore at home, but no, she wears this house to the art gallery, which again is bohemian.
Carrie is creative Carrie. I love it.
We're seeing her stylistically, you know, come into her own in so many ways. So I think that this episode is so interesting, and this is what I'm like, Could I just have a forum of fans that I could talk to about this, because I would love to hear your guys' thoughts, Like what do you think about female sex and the different forms it takes in the episode?
Like you know, Miranda.
Sees, you know, she's got the power over Skipper, right, and Skipper says, oh, I'm addicted to her, you know obviously. And then you know Charlotte, you know, willing to be painted by this artist so that she can advance her thing. Amalitea is her whole way of life is like, you know, this is what I do. I have these you know, handsome rich men, and I go where they want, and I have beautiful jewelry, and I have a wonderful life and isn't it great? And you know, it seems it seems to be working great for her?
Right? Is that is that cool? What do you think?
And then like Carrie, you know, has to kind of decide do I want to be.
That or do I want to not.
Be that and kind of you know, try to afford my shoes but not be able to and get my.
Credit card caught up.
Like it's to me very interesting kind of conundrum that many many people go through, men and women, really, you know, honestly, And.
I think it's still going on.
So I'm super curious what you guys think, and I'm really hoping that maybe you'll tell me. I also want to think this is reminding me a little bit of one comment that we got from last week, which is someone went on and said when we were talking about the value of the twenty something guys, and they said that when Blakely and I were talking about the roommate and how that was a deal breaker, which I think is what we said.
We said something like that and they were like, oh, you know, you guys ruined it for us.
And then I wish I knew how old these these these people were who commented, right, because I want to know are they in their twenties? Right?
Because this is interesting things.
Have changed, for sure, and there's a lot of people who don't, you know, get to live by themselves because the economy is wacky, and you know, COVID happened, and so many things happened, right, So I think probably a lot of people do have roommates that wouldn't probably have had roommates in nineteen ninety eight, right. And the whole idea of value of the twenty something guys is Timothy Offense character and his friends or in their twenties, right, and Carrie and her friends were in our thirties. So there is supposed to be this generational gap happening in the episode, and it seems like we've possibly touched on it too much that made people feel upset about it, I guess. And I think that's a very interesting thing to talk about now, because I still think it's true, probably even more true, that there are these generational gaps. And as part of the reason I wanted to do the podcast is because we've been so lucky to get to do the show since nineteen ninety eight nineteen ninety seven, which is a very long time. Obviously, we've seen so many social trends and changes, and you know, the way people talk about sex and relationships and dating apps. I mean, so many different things have changed, but yet still there do seem to be these gaps between generations where maybe there's misunderstandings, and I'm super interested by that, and certainly what happens when you're trying to date across those gaps is also really interesting. So right, some more on the Instagram, you guys, mere thoughts. You could always write in on the podcast page too, because that's cool.
Thank you for being with me. We are going to have a really fun guest next week. I can't wait. And thank you for joining me for are you a Charlotte. Bye,
